CHAPTER 9: Family, Brazil, Passion

My life hasn’t been an easy road to say the least. Sitting in my backyard patio overlooking my beautiful desert landscape in Las Vegas, it’s easy to forget my bootstrap beginnings. I’ve overcome adversity throughout my whole life to achieve what I’ve accomplished today. I’m a successful engineer with a wonderful family, living in a beautiful home and in a place where we love. These are some of the key ingredients to sustain a happy and healthy lifestyle. All of this would not have been possible without my parents. They have taught me invaluable lessons about hard work, determination, perseverance and most importantly about being a good natured and kind person. Growing up, my parents along with my older brother instilled in me the thirst for a life-bettering education. It is this foundation and the desire to succeed that opened doors to a world of opportunities.

One of the opportunities was to use my engineering background to springboard into an international career with short and long term assignments overseas to fulfill my desire to travel and see the world. To that end, my travels took me to various corners of the world. But it was in a small inland town in Northeastern Brazil where I had a chance encounter that would transform my life. I had just arrived in a small town called Petrolina, approximately 700km from the coast, to manage a $27 million dollar mobile satellite gateway. Over my first weekend, I attended an agriculture fair to promote our products and services. It was the last day of the agriculture fair where they had a few regional bands playing Forró music in an open dirt plain. Forró is a popular music and dance style in the Northeast region of Brazil. With the upbeat music and low ambient lights in the night sky as a backdrop, it felt very romantic in a small town setting. The people were very friendly and pleasant, especially to out of towners. In general, I would say the average Brazilian is a friendly, polite, and welcoming person. As my co-worker and I walked closer toward the live band area, we ran into a group of his lady friends. As I'm being introduced, I gave each one two kisses, one on each cheek. It is customary to give two kisses to the other sex to whom you have just been introduced, sometimes three kisses depending on the region. Brazilian people are very affectionate or friendly and often stand very close when conversing, especially among friends. For the rest of the evening we hung out with them. They were very warm and friendly. I was eager to practice my Portuguese as most Brazilians that I worked with wanted to speak English. They taught me how to dance basic Forró steps, a dance that I love to this day. After all the bands stopped playing around midnight, we decided to head out for a late night snack. They took us to a popular place for late night soup, Rei do Caldo, which is across the river in a smaller town called Juazeiro da Bahia. I continued to engage in Portuguese conversation and took an interest in one of the girls with a beautiful smile and laugh, named Mari. She was always smiling and always laughing, full of life. Her natural beauty and simplicity fascinated me. I dropped Mari and her friends off at her house and we exchanged phone numbers. It was a magical evening and I was eager to see her again. Surprisingly, the next morning she called me at work to say good morning. There was an immediate mutual love interest between us.

Mari at age 7

Mari came from a lower middle class family. Her father had abandoned her before birth. Mari had little to no contact with her father throughout her life. I ran into her father once in December of 2007 at a popular local pizza parlor where he was entertaining the crowd, playing guitar and singing. He seemed to be a talented entertainer. Her single mother, Marlucia, worked very hard to raise and support Mari and her two younger siblings along with their grand-mother as she was forced to look for a job when her husband left her. She was fortunate to work for a textile factory on the night shift for the first six years after Mari was born, before she was promoted to supervisor working on the day shift. Being a small town, job opportunities are scarce and a factory worker is considered a good job. Over the years, Marlucia also supported her younger sister financially as well. Mari and her siblings were raised by her grand-mother as Marlucia worked the night shift. They often called their grandmother mother. Mari had a happy and healthy childhood growing up in a small town. She often played on the streets with the neighborhood kids and has fond memories of her loving and caring grandmother. Her grandmother died of cancer in 2004. Mari had an array of friends growing up in Petrolina but it is Ana Paula Torres, Marcia Damasceno, Maria Pereira, and Lucimeire Ribeiro Silva who are Mari's lifelong friends.

When I arrived in Petrolina in June of 2000, Marlucia was working as an administrative assistant at the shopping mall. Petrolina has a single shopping mall so it is rather prestigious to work at the mall, a regularly visited place. The population was approximately 166,000 when I arrived in June of 2000. Petrolina is situated on the north side of the São Francisco river across from its smaller twin city of Juazeiro da Bahia. Most families lack employment opportunities and have low levels of schooling. The majority of the businesses are operated by mom-and-pop small stores and street vendors. It is a highly competitive environment. The mom-and-pop business model is very lean and often does not need outside workers or hires very few outside workers. In regard to education, most people lack access to higher education beyond high school, which had been the case for Mari. In the 2004/2005 time-frame, a federally funded university to promote higher education in the region was completed. The university is called Universidade Vale do Rio São Francisco with six campuses spread throughout Petrolina-Juazeiro. The main industry for the region is irrigated agriculture drawn from the São Francisco river. In recent years, Petrolina has become Brazil's largest center for the production of irrigated tropical fruit such as mangos, grapes, banana, guavas, and passion fruit. They are exported overseas to the United States and Europe and throughout the domestic market. Over time, big retail corporations came to Petrolina causing a lot of the local businesses to close up shop. By 2016, the population had grown to over 250,000. Petrolina and their population growth rates are among the highest in Brazil driven by the improved economy and access to higher education in the region. With growth comes demand for infrastructure such as roads, water, sanitation, waste management, and housing. There was a single lane main road running through the town from the airport when I arrived in Petrolina in 2000, and sadly there is still a single lane main road today. Needless to say, Petrolina has not kept pace with the population growth over the years, and there is traffic congestion everywhere. Despite the increase in population growth, Petrolina remains a safe and good place to live for Mari's extended family and friends.

Mari and I dated for almost two years while I was living and working in Brazil. We traveled, lived, and worked in various places throughout Brazil for almost two years. In one of our leisurely weekend travels to Fortaleza, I caught the killer dengue fever. Dengue fever is a tropical virus spread by mosquitoes. The dengue virus is related to the viruses that cause the West Nile infection and yellow fever. By the time we returned to Petrolina, I was starting to feel bad but did not think much of it. Over the next couple of days, I developed a high fever, chills, severe headache, joint and muscle pain, and extreme fatigue. Mari came over to take care of me. She called my Brazilian co-workers to come and help carry me to the car and take me to the hospital. She spent the night sleeping on the hospital floor to look after me until I was better. In 2002 as my work contract ended, we decided to move back to the United States and get married. Ever since our first encounter on that magical evening, our lives have been an incredible journey filled with wonderful memories. We love to spend time together. We have had our ups and downs, some smiles and some frowns, just like everyone else. But it is the downs that have made the ups much more worthwhile for us. We’ve two wonderful and beautiful children; Dudu is 21 years old and Melissa is 12 years old. My step-son, Dudu, is a kind and gentle soul. His father passed away when he was nine years old and I adopted and raised him as my own. Dudu is currently attending a 19 week coding bootcamp in downtown Chicago called Designation. He hoped to secure an internship position with a high-tech company in the Chicago area. Melissa is in 7th grade at a middle school in the Seattle area. Mari studied at Universal Spa Academy and obtained her Esthetician license. She is currently a stay-at-home Mom and busy running a storefront in Etsy for her handmade headband boutique called Lil Majesty Boutique and engaging with her almost 200,000 followers on social media. She also has a growing business in graphic design called Boutique Digital Design.

[2014]: Brazil vs. Germany semi-final match

We enjoy spending time with our Brazilian friends on the weekends. I learned to speak Portuguese from my wife and children. I love Brazil. Perhaps, I’m biased as I’m married to a Brazilian. Brazil is a place that will amaze and challenge you at the same time. Brazil is a beautiful country home to diverse people, rich in cultures, and has an incredible array of natural beauty from the waterfalls of Foz do Iguacu to the white sand dunes in the Northeast region to the beautiful Amazon rain-forest, all of which I've the fortunate to visit. Unfortunately, Brazil is in an economic and political crises. It is no secret that Brazil has plenty of social problems including corruption, poverty, violence and crime, lack of education, high unemployment, and of course the Zika virus outbreak, to name a few. But Brazilians are optimists, they tend to spend less time complaining and more time enjoying life over barbecue and beer with family and friends. They are playful, easy-going, and very much vivacious.

In Brazil, I have encountered mostly friendly people, especially in the Northeast region, where my wife was born. They'll often say hello and smile. Brazilians will always find a reason to celebrate about something and everything is a reason for a party or get together. For example, we were in Brazil watching the Brazil vs. Germany semi-final FIFA 2014 World Cup soccer match at a friend's house. Being proud Brazilians, my wife and her friends cried when Brazil lost the match to Germany but shortly afterwards, we celebrated and had a great time. It is the "Brazilian way". There is a Brazilian saying that "they will find a way" as in “dar um jeito” or “jeitinho”. That is to say that Brazilians will always find a way to get out of difficult situations. Brazilians are very warm and naturally humble, especially in the Northeast region where I met my wife. If there is one thing I have learned about Brazilians after traveling to Brazil for many years and being married to a Brazilian, it is that Brazilians love Brazil. They can be very proud and may be easily offended by comments that leave room for misunderstandings (directed towards my wife). My wife can say horrible things about Brazil but if I should join in, sometimes she can get offended and end up defending Brazil instead. I love my wife for it and I feel like I'm a Brazilian at heart. I made a fun video trailer for our 15 year anniversary on iMovie from various clips I gathered during my family trip to my wife's hometown in Petrolina, Brazil in 2014. If you're a Brazilian, you'll understand the humor in the "Amor de Sertao" and in the Northeast region. Otherwise, it's still a nice and funny video.

[1991]: Bodybuilding

I enjoy many things in life, but what I really enjoy most is spending time with my family. My wife and our children are my passion. Outside of my family, I enjoy working out regularly. My friends, Dan and Russell, got me into bodybuilding in High School and I've been working out ever since or whenever time permits. I was a fanatic at one point, as shown in the picture to the right. Because of my professional workload, my workouts are not as intense as I would like but I try to work out at least 3 times per week. My other passion is investing by applying high probability trading strategies and taking advantage of volatility and time decay in selling options on equities, indexes, and futures. Like everyone else, I took a sizable hit during the financial crisis of the 2008/2009 time frame. After the financial crisis, I wanted to learn ways to protect and profit from the downside risk; strategy that would give me an edge. This led me to the world of options trading. Initially, I was buying option contracts in various underlying assets and realized that most of the contracts were expiring worthless as time passes. Then a light bulb went off; why not be the counter-party in issuing these contracts or selling options to collect premium. I obtained a portfolio margin account that allows leverage of 6:1 or more. Selling options by collecting premium in a high implied volatility environment give me the best opportunity for success and profit when the stock price stays the same, moves against me slightly, moves in my favor, or the contraction of the implied volatility or the eventual time decay of the option premium.

My strategy is simple. I sell into strength, out-of-the-money (OTM) calls and puts, in high implied volatility underlying equities, index, futures and collect premium. I manage my winners often by taking money off the table before expiration at profit in the range of 30-60% of option premium and let the probability play out for my losers. To manage my losers, I often roll out my contracts to give me additional time for the underlying to work in my favor and/or sell a straddle (puts or calls) along with it to help get me to breakeven. Occasionally when an underlying equity is assigned, I'll write call options (i.e. covered calls). Earnings season is a great way to profit from a one-day high implied volatility move. I’m overly cautious and very much risk averse but I'm very comfortable with this strategy and have been executing on this strategy since 2009. This strategy is often advertised in the finanacial community as "Equity Income Generator". What I’ve learned over the years of options trading is to be patient and wait for opportunity to present itself and scale into strength. To read more about my wealth building strategy and my plan for retirement, visit my financial posts.

Explore an interactive map with beautiful pictures and videos of our friends and family in Brazil below!